376 GEOLOGICAL MEMOIRS. 



of the interior of Scandinavia ; and the vertical face of their cliff, 

 being directed as it is towards that side most exposed to the 

 beating of the waves, is a perfectly universal phenomenon common 

 to all hard mountain masses, and is exhibited every where on the 

 Danish coast, in the Orkneys, and elsewhere, while in bays and 

 towards sheltered parts there is a more gradual incline. 



Southwards from Gothenborg the road runs for many miles 

 through a tract which is exactly a repetition of this condition, and 

 which I consider has been formerly the sea bottom, exposed for 

 centuries or rather thousands of years to the beating of the waves, 

 but at length has become, at least partially, converted into arable 

 land. Here, however, the rocks are so closely shorn as it were, 

 and so denuded and polished, that one might suppose the action of 

 the waves to have only lately ceased, and it is only here and there 

 that some sorry plant has been able to root itself in the clefts of 

 the rocks. It was in Gothenborg that I first had the opportunity 

 of studying minutely the scratches on these rocks, and any one 

 who could examine them and compare them with those of Gothaelv 

 and others of the neighbourhood of Gothenborg, would declare at 

 once that all of them were in like manner raised sea bottoms of 

 similar origin. The shells, indeed, of species at present inhabiting 

 the Cattegat, are found in the blue clay of the Gothenborg valley, 

 and can be followed as far in the valley of Gothaelv as the granitic 

 barrier over which the Falls of Trolhoetten are poured, where beds 

 of them were discovered a few years ago. 



These almost naked rocks of the neighbourhood of Gothenborg 

 are every where covered with furrows and scratches, the direction 

 of which I found to be about compass east and west, the variation 

 not being greater than about 10° on each side of these bearings. 

 I was also fortunate enough to find one large block, measuring 

 between 100 and 150 cubic feet still lying there; it was much 

 rounded, and a deep and broad furrow traversed it towards the 

 west, which was continued towards the east on a much smaller 

 scale. It was clearly an instance of a block arrested on its way 

 and left behind by the flood, having performed only a part of its 

 intended journey. * 



Quitting the vicinity of Gothenborg, we by no means lose sight 

 of the phenomena of scratched and furrowed rocks, which, indeed, 

 are traceable in the valley of Gothaelv as far as Trolhostten, and 

 are distributed over the whole of the great central plain of Sweden. 

 Here, however, we everywhere see marks of comparatively recent 

 elevation from beneath the sea, but there may be observed a 

 gradual change in the material thus transported eastward ; the 



* I might also here mention another phenomenon which has some, if not 

 snch immediate, reference to these scratches and furrows. A large furrow that 

 1 id heen commenced was stopped in the middle by a great mass of stone firmly 

 jammed in the rock, and the furrow was continued on the upper part of the 

 stone about three feet above its former level. It was manifestly a stone detached 

 and elevated by a disturbance, and, if the whole had not undergone elevation, it 

 would have been at last slowly carried away towards the east. 



